Editorial: Immigration licensing unavoidable

Opinion

Industries should in the best of worlds monitor and regulate their own behaviour, thereby saving taxpayers the expense of keeping them on the straight and narrow. Sometimes, however, they are loath to do that adequately, leaving little option but Government intervention. Such is the case with immigration consultants. Over the years there have been too many tales of unscrupulous advisers promising migrants anything from open work permits to marriage arrangements in exchange for exorbitant fees. In one notable case an agent charged $150,000 for a resident's permit that could have been obtained for the cost of the administration fees.

The Government's response, after a couple of years canvassing the options, will be a law requiring consultants to be licensed and to meet standards set out in a code of conduct. An independent regulatory body, the Immigration Advisers Authority, will be established to administer the code, organise professional training and set up compliance procedures.

The step has become the only feasible one, given the industry's inability to regulate itself - a situation that has provided a fertile field for scams. Some consultants have striven for a viable system of self-regulation through their own voluntary industry body, the Association for Migration and Investment. But, regrettably, only a relatively small number of the country's 1000 advisers saw fit to join.

This undermined the association's earnest efforts, notably its adoption of a code of ethics that may prove the template for the new authority code. Indeed, the continued complaints from people who had been ripped off, or given poor advice and false hope, eventually persuaded even the association to support licensing. That, in itself, spoke volumes of the industry's besmirched image, and the unwillingness of too many of its members to help themselves.

Government legislation will, most importantly, allow standards to be enforced. But those standards will have too narrow an application because lawyers who act as immigration consultants will not have to licensed. The Government's reasoning is that migrants are already protected by that profession's consumer-protection devices, the likes, for example, of the Law Society's disciplinary procedures for members who act unfairly or unethically. Lawyers, however, have not been totally exempt from complaints by the Judiciary about unmerited immigration cases coming before the courts. Much of this exasperation stems from false or utterly unfounded claims for refugee status, a practice that wastes the time and resources of not only the courts but the Immigration Service and the Refugee Status Appeals Authority.

Given this, there seems no reason why lawyers should not be licensed. If they wish to practice in the field of immigration consultancy, they should be have to meet the industry's standards. If, as they contend, their own disciplinary procedures are stricter than those likely to be set out in the industry code, they have absolutely nothing to fear from licensing. Only the unethical and unscrupulous have reason for alarm whether they be consultants or lawyers.

The other problematic area of the new law will be its application to overseas consultants. Much of the swindling of prospective migrants occurs outside New Zealand, but halting that is difficult. It has bedevilled immigration authorities in Australia, who have spent considerable sums of taxpayer money for little reward. There is little to suggest it will be different here.

Such qualms aside, licensing has become a necessity. Migrants should be able to take it for granted that they will be represented by honest and ethical consultants. Likewise, the Government, the formulator of immigration policy, has a right to expect that policy to be presented in the same manner. The enforcement of minimum standards will help ensure that is the case.